


the shattered mirror

by larkspear



Category: RWBY
Genre: Beacon Era Collection, Canon-Typical Everything, Characters and Relationships to be added as they appear, Multi, but expect the typical ones, or maybe not.
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-23
Updated: 2019-04-23
Packaged: 2020-01-24 09:20:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,226
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18568459
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/larkspear/pseuds/larkspear
Summary: The memories of Beacon are scattered, warped by time and grief, but never gone.(or, a collection of snapshots from Beacon)





	1. prelude

**Author's Note:**

> this is just a collection of various one-shots set during beacon for when an idea strikes me and i wanna write something quick between other fics/projects/whatever. don't expect any regular schedule, sorry! but it will update for a while
> 
> also, sorry for the weird first chapter, i just wanted to do something thematic and metaphor-heavy and dramatic to start things off. the rest is more grounded, i swear!

  


In her childhood home, there had been a mirror. Round, barely larger than a dinner plate, hanging at the end of the hallway that lead to the bedrooms. No frame, just the raw edges of the mirror bare to the world. Silver like the moon, like a spoon, like ( _her and her mother have_ grey _eyes_ ).

Ruby doesn't remember exactly how it'd happened. Yang was probably roughhousing, as she did, and Ruby probably threw something at her clumsily. All she knew was that the mirror had fallen to the ground and shattered.

Ruby had cried, because that's what any girl her age would have done. Yang had scampered off to hide behind a door. And then her mother heard her crying and came up, seen the broken mirror (had Ruby cut herself on the shards? She can't remember), and gathered Ruby up in her arms and cloak.

Its perfect circle was shattered like the moon. The reflection twisted into a dozen pieces. Soft lamp light caught on the jagged edges of the mirror pieces and refracted into something different, something brighter and distilled.

They never did replace that mirror.  
  
  


* * *

 

It's not that Ruby didn't think about her mother, or that particular memory, but it still came back to her the first night at Beacon. She'd gone to the bathrooms to brush her teeth before bed and found each sink had a single, large, _round_ mirror. It was more than large enough for two or three people to crowd around in easily, but all Ruby could think about was that broken mirror and her mother's voice. And...

Ruby looked into the silver mirror. Her family had always called her eyes grey. Ozpin had called them silver. If she looked really closely, it was almost as if the light from the overhead lights reflected off of her eyes and into the mirror and back and forth, endlessly.

"Weird," She whispered to herself, and stopped thinking about it. The mirror remained.  
  


 

* * *

 

In the ruins of Beacon's dormitories, there had been mirror. The rampaging Grimm had torn through the rooms and facilities, looking for any stragglers. None of them had cared about the property damage. A couple of rambunctious Beowulves had torn up the girl's bathrooms, mostly through knocking each other into shower curtains and sinks. When they left, all that remained was rubble and ash.

And in it lay a broken mirror, fractured like the moon that shone down on it now through a hole in the ceiling. Light caught along the jagged edges of its broken pieces and refracted, a million little sparks.  
  


* * *

 

So too does memory refract, as if like light, through the jagged edges of trauma and grief. That which remains might be warped, but it glimmers brighter than it would have before. It's hard to say if that's a good thing.


	2. by any other name

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mistakes are made. Ruby says she doesn't care. Weiss does.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i believe it's canon that port and oobleck were TAs when STRQ was going to beacon, so. things can get weird when you have relatives who went to the same school as you. 
> 
> this is set sometime after the "weiss vibrates intensely about leadership" arc but before the "blake retrieval arc (part 1)". more or less. the vol 1 timeline is what i want it to be.

If you asked her, Weiss would say that Professor Oobleck's class was... informative. Yes. That was the word she would used. Informative. There was certainly a great degree of information in this class. History was a very important subject! It was one she enjoyed as much as anything else. The main problem was the speed at which the Professor gave this information.

The first week of class, she had thought that maybe it was beginning-of-year jitters for everyone. Not that she was jittery. But now that they were in their second week, Weiss was beginning to worry Professor Oobleck would never slow his pace. It was almost... hypnotic.

Weiss remained sitting upright, even if she was fighting how slow and heavy each blink was. It didn't help that today was some basic history of the Kingdoms, which she already knew everything about. Or, well, enough about.

"Now," Professor Oobleck began after zipping back to the center of the room. "Can anyone tell me what's unique about Vacuo's governing system?"

Beside her, Ruby raised her hand. Weiss was quietly pleased that her team leader was making a renewed effort to focus on class after their talk.

"Yes, Miss Rose?"

"Vacuo has no central government. Instead, Shade Academy serves as the main seat of order." She shrugged, going off-book. "At the end of the day, people will still listen to Huntsmen or Huntresses."

 _Very good, Ruby_ , Weiss thought. Professor Oobleck also nodded his approval.

"Very good, Summer."

Ruby froze. Yang, next to her sister, froze. Even Professor Oobleck froze.

The silent tension lasted a moment too long. Even the sleepiest of students lifted their heads and noticed something was off. On her other side, Blake shifted, sensing the discomfort as much as Weiss did. It was becoming more than awkward.

"-Of course, that lack of order has lead to some tension with the other kingdoms over border disputes," Weiss interrupted. Professor Oobleck turned to her and blinked, broken out of the uncomfortable stupor.

"Yes. Indeed. Exactly." He cleared his throat. "Thank you, Miss Schnee. Once such incident occurred when..."

Someone a couple rows behind her muttered " _showoff_ ," but she caught Yang giving her an appreciative glance.

Ruby had folded her hands in front of her and was staring at them. Weiss couldn't read her at all. Sure, she didn't know her partner that well yet, but she'd never seen Ruby like _this_ . Weiss tried to catch Yang' s eyes again for some kind of explanation, but the blonde girl was keeping her gaze low, too.

Weiss looked helplessly over at Blake. Blake just shook her head and gave her an equally helpless look.

 

* * *

 

 

The remainder of Professor Oobleck's class passed without incident. The bell rang and everyone, as per usual, gathered up their things and poured into the hallway.

Despite their boisterousness, Weiss had quickly learned that the sisters tended to match their pace to their teammates'. Her and Blake had shared a look and both slowed way down upon exiting the classroom to get them all to hang back a bit.

The other students were happy to brush passed them. Team JNPR lingered behind, but she caught a glimpse of Blake giving Nora and Ren a meaningful look, at which point the pair had quickly shepherded Jaune and Pyrrha further along. Soon enough, it was just team RWBY.

"Alright," Weiss stared pointedly at the sisters. "What was that all about? You two got all weird when Professor Oobleck called Ruby by the wrong name."

Yang and Ruby glanced at each other.

"Summer was my mother’s name," Ruby said.

Oh.

"We're going to be late," Yang said stiffly before anyone else could speak. She and Ruby both picked up their pace, with Blake following along hesitantly. Weiss felt frozen in place.

Oh.

 

* * *

 

 

If she hadn't known better, Weiss would have thought nothing had happened. Ruby and Yang continued the rest of the day completely normally, even fighting over the last cup of pudding at lunch. Even Blake didn't seem rattled, but then again Blake was already subdued and hard to read on a good day, so Weiss couldn't really tell if this was a change.

Weiss, on the other hand, felt like she'd broken something and she was still waiting for someone to find it and yell at her. She felt... awkward. Beyond awkward.

Just after Professor Goodwitch's class in the afternoon, Weiss made a point of cornering Blake. She knew her shadowy teammate usually stopped back to their room before disappearing somewhere on campus to... read, or something?

"Can I talk to you?" Weiss asked from the doorway. Blake nearly jumped, scrutinized her with narrowed eyes, and then sat on her bed.

"Alright," she replied. "What is this about?"

Of course she'd planned this conversation in her head, but that didn't make it any easier to actually say. Weiss wrung her hands together and paced the room.

"Weiss?" Blake asked, almost sounding concerned.

"It's about today," She blurted out. "That thing this morning. I am... concerned that I pushed too much. Or that I said the wrong thing. And I am unsure of how to fix it."

"The thing with Ruby?" Blake blinked. Weiss nodded. "And you're asking me... because you don't want to ask Yang how to talk to her sister about their dead mother."

"...Yes," Weiss replied, embarrassed to have been read that easily. "That's exactly it."

"I don't think Ruby is upset," Blake replied. "But if you're really worried, just apologize to her. It can't hurt."

Weiss just stared at her for a moment.

Blake sighed. "Okay, I'm only telling you how to apologize _this_ time because you seem genuine about wanting to do right. Just... Don't try and be formal or posture. Make it simple, but speak from the heart. That's what the best apology should be."

Weiss thought this over for a moment. "Thank you, Blake."

"Can I go now?"

 

* * *

 

The hard part was getting Ruby alone. Weiss had hoped to ambush her after dinner, but Ruby and Yang had gotten sidetracked talking with some upperclassmen. Weiss admitted defeat and went back to their room to study, though she really just sat nervously and stared at her book without reading anything. Blake, on the other hand, seemed content to lay in bed and read.

The door opened and both of them looked up. The sisters had arrived, laughing about some joke they'd made earlier. Blake suddenly stood.

"There you are, Yang," She said while heading immediately for the door. "That book you wanted is at the library."

"Huh? I didn't-" Yang glanced from Blake, to Weiss, to Ruby, and back to Blake. "Oh. Oh yeah. That book. Uh-huh. We should go before the library closes."

"Right. Exactly."

They left before Weiss could point out that the library didn't close until curfew, which was in a few hours. Instead, she was left alone with Ruby.

...Ah. She made a mental note to thank Blake later.

Ruby started to climb up to her bunk when Weiss realized she needs to act _now_. She cleared her throat, and Ruby paused halfway up to look back at her.

"I have something to say to you," Weiss announced.

"Uh." Ruby dropped down. "Okay...?"

"I... apologize for this morning," Weiss began. No, that was too formal. What had Blake said? Simple. "I'm sorry if I made you uncomfortable. It's clearly a sensitive subject and I shouldn't have pried."

Ruby blinked at her once, twice. Then she shook her head gently. "It's fine. I figure, you were gonna find out sooner or later and it was gonna be awkward no matter what, right?" She shrugged. "Better now than later."

"Still. I'm sorry about your mother."

This time, Ruby's gaze drifted out to the window. "It's okay. It was a long time ago. It just surprised me."

Weiss debated if she should move closer to try and be... comforting. She tried to imagine what Winter would do... No, what Klein would do. So she went over and sat on her bed, not too far where Ruby was standing. After a second, Ruby took a seat next to her.

"Seriously, it's fine." Ruby laughed nervously. "My dad and uncle do that to me sometimes, but with them I'm used to it, y'know?" She shrugged. "I knew the professors here knew her, but I just wasn't expecting that.

"Does it happen to Yang, too?"

"What?" Ruby gave her a weird look. "No." There was something weird in her tone that completely lost Weiss. After a moment, Ruby clarified (maybe?): "I look almost exactly like my mom."

Again, Weiss tried to think of what her sister would say. No, Weiss loved Winter, but Winter was never... warm. Ruby wouldn't appreciate Winter's style the way Weiss did. So she tried to imagine what she _wished_ someone would say to her in this kind of situation.

"If you were want to... talk, I am here for you. I'm your partner." Weiss said with all the gentleness she could muster (not much). Ruby looked at her. "About your mom, or anything."

"Thanks, Weiss." Ruby smiled, and wiped at her eye. "You're a good friend."

Weiss wasn't sure she believed that, but she could try to get there.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> blake picked a book for yang to actually check out so they'd seem less suspicious. it was the first in a series called _Saddles and Seduction_ , a period romance set in the wild west of vacuo. yang loved it a little bit too much.


	3. pick of the litter

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Blake makes a choice.

Obvious cat jokes aside, Blake could nail this landing strategy in her sleep. Slowing herself to a safe stop in a forest? Please. So Blake decided to devote her time sailing through the air to something more important: narrowing down candidates for her partner.

Sure, most of the students had probably assumed that the partners would be random, but Blake had read between the lines and realized that one could pick if they were clever. All she had to do was move unseen through the trees until she found someone she wanted, then drop down and meet their eyes when she was ready. Simple.

And there was no way Blake wasn't going to take control of this into her own hands.

So.

Really, the choice was kind of obvious, but Blake decided to run through all the options, just to be thorough.

Firstly, the Schnee girl was out. No questions.

Second, there were the gang of four boys at that'd been at the far end of the line on the cliff. She only knew one of them - Cardin Winchester, she'd noted his name as soon as she'd seen him scoff at some other faunus students - but they all seemed cut from the same cloth. No way.

Ugh, why couldn't she have gotten to known any of the other faunus students in her class? Then again... what would they think of her choice to hide? Or her history? Wouldn't trying to exclusively spend time with faunus blow her cover? Or worse, what if they were connected to the White Fang? What if word got back to-

Blake shook the thought from her mind, and focused on hooking the blade of Gambol Shroud into a branch so she could swing to a branch in the next tree over. When her feet landed squarely on the bark of a thick branch, she resumed moving down the list.

There was Pyrrha Nikos. She seemed nice. Blake remembered an interview with her in a magazine recently where she' d said something polished but positive about faunus rights. That was a plus.

But Pyrrha Nikos was too famous. She'd draw too much attention. A partner who could keep the majority of the limelight was good, but not _that_ much.

There was the blond boy she’d seen. Giallo? Galben? Something like that. He seemed... in over his head. She'd have to do very little to seem like an average, accomplished student next to him. Nobody of interest. Then again, he'd probably draw a lot of attention from the teachers.

There was the loud pink girl, Nora, and the quiet green boy, Ren. He, especially, seemed on her level. But they already were something of a pair, and Blake didn't want to get in between that. Maybe, _maybe_ if one of them got snatched up by someone else.

That just left the two sisters. Who, to be honest, were her first pick anyway.

When they'd approached her the other night, they'd been... warm. Genuine. Curious about her, but their reason for being interested was honest enough (she _had_ made an impression by chewing out the Schnee heiress). Their easy sibling camaraderie had a kind of honesty that reminded her, with a homesick pang, of her father. The two of them were just loud enough to keep everyone's attention on them and not her, but not so loud as to draw extra attention. They seemed _kind_. Plus, if she picked one, the other would probably be on her team anyway, so that left one one slot up to chance.

The question was: which one?

The younger one - Ruby - had been genuinely interested in her book. That was a pleasant surprise. She seemed almost shy, more interested in weapons than people. Blake could get along with another fish out of water.

But.. Ruby was young, young enough that her entry had to be special. Ozpin's eyes might be on her. And she'd been too curios for her own good. She would ask too many questions about her partner's mysterious past.

And besides. From what few glances Blake had gotten at Ruby's weapon, it looked like some kind of scythe, maybe with a rifle build in. That wouldn't work great with Blake's mid-range blade-and-ribbon style. And... the idea of getting that close to someone using a red bladed weapon made her skin crawl. At least not as partners. Not that she thought Ruby was anything like him, but... still. Why make herself uncomfortable unnecessarily? She deserved to avoid that. She did.

So that left the oldest sister. Which was fine by Blake. Yang had seemed warm, but knew how to read Blake's prickliness enough to back off eventually. That was a pleasant thought, having someone who would give her some _space_ . And Yang would be too busy fussing over her sister, right? Someone who was friendly but not pushy would be... nice. Different.

From a practical standpoint, well. She didn't know what Yang's weapon was. But Blake had seen her wearing some kind of gauntlets, so she guessed it was close range. That'd pair well with her style, if she was being pragmatic.

Alright. Yes. Blake took a deep breath. She' d track down Yang.

Her ears twitched under her bow. The fabric muffled noises a bit, but she could still make out the distant noise of Yang's yelling. Bingo.

Moving from tree to tree was a bit too slow and precarious, so Blake ended up dropping down to the ground to just slink through the bushes. Soon enough, she saw the flash of golden hair that meant she' d gone the right way. Uncertainty gripped her and Blake hesitated.

...She'd just follow Yang for a while. Just to make sure. Absolutely sure.

Her potential partner was busy yelling for... anyone. Good thing Blake had heard Ruby's high pitched voice a ways back, in the other direction, so she didn't have to worry about the sisters finding each other before she made up her mind.

The tell-tale growl of a Grimm nearby meant that Blake would get to see Yang's fighting style in action. So she remained hidden in a bush while Yang drew out the pair of Ursai.

Alright. Just punching everything wasn't what Blake had expected, but she could work with that. And something about the way Yang made silly little quips at the Ursai, with nobody around to hear her (as far as Yang would've known) amused Blake despite herself. What kind of person made dumb jokes alone in a forest? It was almost charming.

Then something... happened, Blake couldn't quite see, but Yang's demeanor changed and something flared and Blake watched in mild awe at Yang punched an Ursa through few some trees. Whoa. That settled it.

As the second Ursa charged for Yang, Blake rose from her hiding place and prepared Gambol Shroud. All it took was one clean hit to the Ursa's back and the Grimm went down.

Of course, she caught the way Yang stared at the Ursa, and then her weapon as she pulled it free with the flick of her wrists, and then her. Their eyes met. Blake decided to be bold, and so she smirked.

Yang, almost frustratingly, followed it up with a shrug and one-liner. "I could've taken him."

"Maybe," Blake teased.

_Yeah_ , she decided. _Good choice_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> you ever think about how carefully blake must've calculated getting on ruby and yang's team, but still ended up with a SCHNEE on her team? whiplash.


End file.
